


Lex Talionis

by Medie



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Community: hc_bingo, Gen, Non-Consensual Violence, forced transformation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-01
Updated: 2013-01-01
Packaged: 2017-11-23 04:37:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/618150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medie/pseuds/Medie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You deserve to die slowly. Badly. Screaming like my family. Like my children. You shouldn't live another second on this earth, but that's actually what's saving you. You should feel everything that they felt, but you'd rather be dead than be one of us. It just doesn't seem fair to give you what you want.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lex Talionis

**Author's Note:**

> written for the HC_bingo prompt: forced to rely on an enemy/rival

It's an old tradition. One most of the old families try to pretend doesn't exist. Kate heard it mentioned, once, not long after she was let in on the family secret. A hunter from another family had killed the son of a powerful pack on the East Coast and been forced to surrender his own for it. The pack had been an old one, a lineage that had been old and established long before the Argents had first joined the hunt. Possibly one of the oldest, tracing their roots back to Romania, with an according respect for history and tradition.

They had grieved their son and then they had decided. 

The tradition was obscure, old, but it was in the Code. It wasn't until that night, when her father had spat and raged, that she'd realized the Code was a literal, physical thing that was as much treaty as it was tradition. 

Worse, that the werewolves _knew_ about it. 

Wolves like that pack. Armed with the hunter's scent, they'd tracked him back to his home and his family, issuing a simple ultimatum. 

To avoid further bloodshed, they would take one of the hunter's children as their own. A child who would be raised in tribute to the one who'd been murdered.

Kate still remembered lying on the floor of the upstairs hall, listening to her father as he'd fumed. She'll never forget the way he'd spoken, the biting precision of the words that described the standoff between the hunters and the wolves. Wolves whipped to a fury by the death of a child. 

Even a thirteen-year-old Kate had known what that meant. There wasn't anything more dangerous than a wounded animal: except, maybe, an entire pack of them.

Her father had been furious, but her mother had been pragmatic. It was Mom who'd pointed out the matriarch's decision to submit hadn't been much of a choice at all. She'd been facing the slaughter of her entire family. A slaughter brought on by her own son's stupidity. He'd broken the Code and betrayed the family.

There hadn't been anything they could do but agree. Even if it had meant she would be handing over her own grandchild.

Which she had. 

She'd looked at Chris beside her, horrified, whispering, "Mom wouldn't do that to us, right? She _loves us_!"

Chris was older, had been hunting with Dad, and had seen for himself what an angry werewolf could do. He'd scowled, so dark and angry that Kate had inched backward. "You don't get it, do you? It doesn't matter if Mom loves us or not. It didn't matter with Mrs. Hayes either. Her son _broke the Code_. The wolves could have killed them all and been in the right doing it. She didn't have a choice but hand over the baby."

"They're gonna make him into a wolf, Chris." 

"No, they won't," Chris had shaken his head. "They'll let him choose. They always let the humans choose. It's _tradition_." 

"Then—"

"It was the only way the Alpha could protect his family. The wolves wanted blood. They wanted vengeance for that kid. If they took it, the hunters would have responded by coming after them. It wouldn't have stopped. It would've meant war and everybody died. Question isn't whether Mrs. Hayes loved her family, but if her son loved her. If he had, he never would've killed that kid and risked everyone's lives in the process." Chris had gotten up, turned his back on Kate and walked into his bedroom. "If you love Mom, do her a favor; don't break the Code."

*

She remembered those words after the fire. Standing in the woods and watching the Hale house burn. "Don't worry, Big Brother," she'd said under her breath, "No one's coming after us for this one." 

*

Except someone did. 

*

Kate didn't see the Alpha that night. She'd seen a smaller wolf, a beta maybe, little more than a shadow as it had jumped from one roof to the other. She thought, maybe, she'd gotten a shot into that one, but she couldn't be sure.

Everything went black before she could find out.

*

Waking up, she hadn't recognized the man crouching over her, but she could guess. The shiny patchwork of scar tissue running the length of his face had definitely come from a burn and the ceiling above him was scored and charred.

"Yes," he said, seeing where her gaze had gone, "We're there. Tradition demands it, really." He settled to the floor beside her, laying a hand on her hair. "We had a copy of the hunter's code here. It was in the library. Might still be there, actually. My sister-in-law was a librarian and _fanatical_ about protecting the old books. I think every trip my brother ever took her on involved books somehow." He hummed a little. Some old song Kate barely recognized. "The things we do for love, I guess." 

"If you're going to kill me, just get it over with. I don't give a fuck about your sister-in-law."

"That much is obvious," he'd leaned down, smiling pleasantly. "You killed her." 

Finding out he was indeed a Hale was less a surprise than the final nail in her coffin. She closed her eyes. "They'll come looking for me."

"Yes, they will."

The easy agreement made her open her eyes again. A scream tried to work its way free of her throat, but his hand on her neck killed the sound before it could begin. Kate gasped for air and fought his grip, clawing at his hand and the floor beneath her in her desperation to break free.

"She was the one who told me about the tradition, actually." It was difficult to make out some of the words, said as they were through his fangs, but she got the gist of it. "You see, when she was a kid, a hunter murdered her younger brother. Poor little guy had been running in the woods, chasing after his siblings. He was too young to change himself, but he loved being out there and—" he shook his head. "Well, I'm sure you can guess for yourself what happened next." 

She could. She had a feeling she'd heard this story from the other side. 

"The pack had been ready for all out war. It was all her father could do to hold them back until his wife reminded him of the tradition: a life for a life." He shook his head. "I remember sitting there, listening to the story and realizing that I _knew_ that kid. I'd run with him on a full moon. My niece was going to stay with him when she went to college. He was a hunter's kid and a wolf. I couldn't imagine it, then. Taking a _hunter_ into your home and raising them as one of your own."

He looked down at her, eyes cold with fury. "Then my family burned alive and I realized that tradition was all I had left." 

"Just _kill me_ ," Kate hissed. She knew the rules. She couldn't go home. She'd never be able to hide it and Chris was as devoted to the Code now as he ever had been. Victoria was her father's puppet and speaking of Dad...

Fuck. 

There was no going home and there was no living with it.

" _Kill me_ ," she said, snarled, and lashed out at him. He didn't seem to feel it. He wasn't even looking at her anymore. He was looking at the room. Something that might have been grief in a human flickered in his expression then died.

"No," he smiled. "Truth is, I want to rip your throat out so badly I can already feel the blood on my fingers. You deserve to die slowly. Badly. Screaming like my family. Like my children. You shouldn't live another second on this earth, but that's actually what's saving you. You should feel everything that they felt, but you'd rather be dead than be one of us. It just doesn't seem fair to give you what you want." 

He smiled and leaned down, his lips brushing her neck as he murmured, almost gleefully, "Besides, it's _tradition_." 

*

She woke up alone and ran. 

*

The bite had healed. There was the faintest hint of a scar on her shoulder, but that was it. Kate knew better than to go home. With torn clothes, no money, and Chris probably calling every contact in the state to find her, there was nowhere safe she _could_ go.

Nowhere but one.

"Look at it this way, Kate," she said, walking out into the morning sun, "If you're really lucky, maybe Derek will kill you."

After all, it was tradition.


End file.
